Live and rocking

Craig Marine, EXAMINER STAFF CRITIC

Published 4:00 am, Monday, August 14, 1995

MOUNTAIN VIEW - Every so often, a band comes along and writes the perfect rock song. Not everyone may agree upon its perfection, but it clearly touches enough people in a certain way to qualify. "Stairway to Heaven" was a perfect rock song, as was "Highway to Hell." There, in a nutshell, is the rock 'n' roll dichotomy.

So when a band like Live - four guys from York, Pa., just struggling to make it - manages to create a tune as powerful and evocative as "Lightning Crashes," strange things happen to its universe. Like 3 million strange things and counting, the number of people who have purchased copies of Live's second album, "Throwing Copper," to give it its triple platinum status.

Add to this the magnificent stage presence the band projects, as it did during its concert at the Shoreline Amphitheatre Sunday night, and it's easy to see why Live is being pegged to be the Next Big Thing, with U2 and Bruce Springsteen comparisons feeding the hoopla. Luckily for the band members, they seem to actually have their heads on fairly straight and clearly understand that the crowds are here for songs, not poses. And songs they got.

The first hint at what the show might offer as Live began with "The Dam At Otter Creek" was that Patrick Dahlheimer's bass was set on "punch a hole in your stomach" level, which is the setting somewhere above 10 and just below "you'll never hear the birds greet the morning again" level. Some of these songs felt like you'd just gone a few rounds while Mike Tyson rediscovered his body shots.

The second thing you notice is how much this band plays as a unit. Dahlheimer, drummer Chad Gracey, guitarist Chad Taylor and singer / guitarist Ed Kowalczyk have been touring together for so long that they know exactly what their mates are capable of doing. It's not as if every note is preordained - far from it. But if the guitarist takes off on a jaunt, the bassist and drummer are going to keep the bottom end solid for when he returns.

Live performed most of the songs from "Throwing Copper," as well as a few from their less successful but still interesting first album, "Mental Jewelry." While

"Pain Lies on the Riverside" and "Operation Spirit" from the first record were entertaining enough, it was the second record the crowd wanted to hear. And they weren't disappointed.

Along with "Lightning Crashes," there are several other fine songs on "Throwing Copper," songs that explore the search for faith and understanding in an increasingly frightening society. What gives Live its popularity, besides the members' fine musicianship, is the consistently positive message it struggles to produce from the fray. It's enough for some of the more distinctly nihilistic bands and fans to term Live as

"goody-goody," but so be it. When they hit the stage, led by the hyper-frenetic Kowalczyk, they are some bad boys.

They have a great song called "Waitress," which has a comic tone reflecting that while the woman serving them might have been less than pleasant, she was nonetheless deserving of a tip of some sort. Then when you listen more closely, the song becomes more. "We all get the flu, we all get AIDS," Kowalczyk sings. "We've got to stick together. After all, everybody's good enough for some change."

Probably the best song in the Live repertoire right now, next to "Lightning Crashes," is the existential-sounding "I Alone." In fact, if this song is anything, it could be the John Hinckley theme music, with its haunting, howling vocals screaming over the guitars, "I alone love you, I alone tempt you, I alone love you, fear is not the end of this!"

Not exactly the kind of sentiment that's going to get Hallmark on the phone, but it's got power to burn, you can dance to it and I'll give it a 95, Dick. Live is on the cusp of becoming the most identifiable American band since Creedance Clearwater Revival rolled out of the swamplands of El Cerrito singing about bayous and bad moons. If they keep playing the way they played Sunday night, there are going to be a lot of people bragging about seeing Live before they started filling up football stadiums. Yes, they are that good.&lt;